Broken Reflection
by white pedal
Summary: Joey has left his father for good one night, but not before telling him what he has become because he let alcohol and gambling consume his life, and he became as a human being, as well as a father. Joey/Mr. Wheeler


**A tragedy that I worked on a year ago. Enjoy**

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Joey was on his knees, bleeding from his mouth, with the addition of having bruises on his face. He was holding his stomach from being punched and was gasping for air, he looked up at the man who was doing this to him.

Jordan Wheeler. His father.

Jordan had dirty blonde hair like his son but was a complete mess. He had a roughly shaved face, was wearing a dirty white tank top, green army pants and a pair of boots. His brown, bloodshot eyes were filled with anger and seething resentment against his son.

"You ruined my life, you brat!" Jordan spat out, "For seventeen goddamn years I had to put up with you! Especially since your bitch mother tricked me into sleeping with her that brought you into this world in the first place!"

Joey stood up and glared at the man. He spat out some blood from his mouth.

"Well it was no picnic living with you, you lazy drunk!" Joey exclaimed, "for seventeen years I had to put up with your crap!"

Jordan punched Joey again. The young man fell to the floor on his side, Jordan marched over and grabbed him by the hair.

"I was gonna be somebody," Jordan said, "I was going to make something of myself...then she came along and ruined everything that I worked for!"

Joey looked at Jordan with a smirk.

"You're pathetic," Joey started, "There ya go again, blaming the world for something you and Ma did. You knew when you were in college you had way to much shit to do before ya graduated." Jordan tugged Joey's hair, making him wince.

"Shut up!" Jordan dropped Joey's head and walked away from, he continued to talk.

"You're mother was a sly one, she said all those sweet words to me, holding my hand, giving me those kisses...she played the game very well, that woman."

Jordan sat in his chair in the kitchen.

"Then that night…that was when she made her moves that got me into bed with her...that conniving little bitch. Then you know what happened later boy?"

Joey knew the answer to that. His father was a college boy who was about to graduate and have a bright future ahead of him, it was one day when he met his ex-wife, and Joey's mother, Lynn, who was barely out of high school. Little did he know was that Lynn was using him for his money and planned to leave him as soon as she got what she wanted. Many people on campus, including his parents, pleaded with Jordan not to get involved with Lynn as she was not to be trusted, but he refused to listen and they began their relationship.

She made sure to make Jordan fall for her and even went as far as to sleep with him to fall under her spell. That was a mistake, without thinking a week later after that night Lynn accidentally got pregnant with Joey.

They never intended for that to happen, Jordan was still doing work to graduate and Lynn was only using him for the opportunity to get his money when he was working for an internship at KaibaCorp. Soon after Joey was born life got a bit difficult, Jordan had to support his son and Lynn now because her parents kicked her out of her home and they were going to take custody of Joey after he was born, so they had to leave in order to keep their son.

The relationship between Jordan and Lynn began to turn sour after a year being together. They would fight everyday and they slept in different rooms, of course Jordan stayed for Joey's sake.

Though it was when he still had a heart and compassion.

Soon Lynn got pregnant again, and they started to patch things up and Jordan was able to get to work to finish his last two years of college to get his diploma. He was a bit distant from Joey because he had him young but was willing to stick by him and he loved Lynn and his unborn child.

When Serenity was born, that's when the Wheeler family started having problems again.

After she was born, the doctors checked her and they found out Serenity was born with bad eyesight and doctors were trying to figure out what was causing it, and it won't be until fourteen years later when Joey entered Duelist kingdom that a doctor would call him and tell him that Serenity's disease was Unilateral Retinoblastoma and that Serenity's sight not only hanged in the balance, but her life as well. Due to the stress for his daughter's sight and her well being, Jordan couldn't concentrate on his studies as he was giving Serenity all the care and attention she needed. Soon, catastrophically, he fell behind on his studies.

When it was the year Jordan had to graduate he couldn't take the exam as Serenity had to go to a doctor's appointment. Because of that, he missed the test and he failed the course.

Not only did he fail his test, he got fired from his job and they dropped his internship at the company. After that he didn't have any money left to pay for school. So, to his despair, he was forced to drop out and not get his degree.

His whole life was shattered and his dreams were destroyed. To drown his sorrows he began drinking, now when he looks at Joey and Serenity, it made him sick so he began to physically abuse them.

Lynn wasn't home much anymore and it made him even angrier. They started fighting again and she calls him a worthless drunk, those days he would either be at the bar or in his recliner, or torturing Joey and Serenity in a drunken rage.

Over the years the family went into debt as Jordan started getting addicted to gambling and would spend the family's income on alcohol. Not only did they live in poverty, they lived in one of the worst neighborhoods in the city.

He despised his children. The love he had for them was gone, he would punch Joey regularly and would often slap Serenity and pull her hair, so the children left the house as much as they could to get away from the man.

He hated Joey mostly because he was the accidental pregnancy that started the whole mess, especially now that their marriage was falling apart. But the child he hated the most was Serenity. She cost him a fortune since the day she was born and because of her he failed his final exam, he lost his job and internship at the company he so desperately wanted to work at, and because of her he had to drop out of college and ruined his chance's to graduate. There were times where he wished that Serenity was never born.

One day when Jordan was strolling in town he bumped into a man who was upset. They immediately fought as Jordan now had a short temper from his problems at home, the guy though said he was pissed off because a woman conned him after sleeping with him.

Jordan asked him who and the man said something that made Jordan's blood run cold and turned his world upside down forever.

He said her name was Lynn Wheeler.

Outraged, when he got home, he confronted his wife. There was shouting, yelling, screaming and cursing all night, they threw things at each other and Jordan called Lynn atrocious names and accused of her of being a whore.

That was when Lynn confessed everything to Jordan in the heat of the moment. She never loved him and she was using him to get his money when he worked at the company and then leave him, but her plan backfired when she got pregnant with Joey.

Jordan lost it.

He let himself get love struck by a gold digger who wanted him for his money, now he lost his job, internship, education and his dreams of success because of her and having children early, especially when he never wanted to create them. He had enough and told Lynn that he wanted a divorce and he never wanted to see her or Serenity again, and made it clear that if he ever saw their daughter again, he would kill her on the spot without hesitation.

Then after his ex-wife and daughter left, he started abusing Joey even more since he is a reminder of his mistake of being with Lynn in the first place. He still hated his son, even though he is the one working and bringing in the family's income.

"You got no one to blame but ya self!" Joey exclaimed, "like I said, you had to much work to do to screw around, and I know that everybody told you that ma can't be trusted! Yet you did her anyways!"

Jordan got out his chair and shouted.

"What the hell do you know boy?! You have no idea what she put me through!"

"...I do Pa," Joey starts, "When I was at the hospital when Serenity was getting her surgery, mom became cold to me after everyone stopped looking at us. She hates me because I made her get stuck with you, saying she wanted to abort me but you said you would care for her…"

Jordan glared at Joey. When Lynn was pregnant, Jordan told her not to abort the baby and said he would be a good father and be there for Lynn, but after everything went through.

"I should never of told her not to."

Joey just looked back at his father, "And she didn't just made you and me suffer dad. Serenity almost went blind because of Ma's stupid choices. She had the money to pay for surgery but lied to Serenity that she didn't, she was going to use Serenity to collect disability checks if she never got the surgery. She lied about the cost of the operation and was using us as game pieces, she was willing to play Russian Roulette with Serenity with not only her sight but with her life to! If she didn't get the surgery not only would Serenity be blind but the tumor could've spread to her brain and killed her!"

Jordan shook his head in disgust and sneered at him. He hated how Joey loved Serenity even if though she cost him thousands of dollars when she was sick.

"How can you live with yourself knowing you paid for that bitches surgery?! You know Lynn won't let you see her now since you ruined her scam!"

Joey got up and walked closer to his dad. Joey punched his father and knocked him to the ground.

Jordan held his jaw and was now angry.

"You shitty brat!" Jordan exclaimed, he leaped up and attacked Joey. The two were throwing punches at each other, Joey even smashed a beer bottle over his father's head and was causing him to bleed. It wasn't until Jordan reached for a piece of shard glass and cut Joey's cheek.

As Jordan punched Joey again, Joey kneed him in the gut and pushed him off. Both men were breathing heavily and Joey wiped the blood off of his face.

"...I'm done." Joey breathed.

Jordan glared, "What? Fighting? Of course you are, coward."

Joey glared, "...No...I'm done with you...I'm leaving."

Jordan's eyes widened in shock and bolted up as Joey stood up and limp a bit, "Leaving?! And where the fuck do you think you're going?!"

Joey snapped his head back at his father and glared, "Anywhere but here! I'm done living with you!" he yelled, "I have stuck by you since day one even though you beat me! When I was in elementary school, middle school and now high school I got a job to not only pay for my education but to make sure we had food in our stomachs, a roof over our heads and to pay off your gambling debts!"

Joey walked closer to his father, and before his father could say anything Joey continued, "And you know what...even after all of that...I still got beaten by you, called names by you and was told I was going to be worth nothing...and end up worse than you...you thought you sacrificed everything? Your dreams...I SACRIFICED MY WHOLE CHILDHOOD TO HELP YOU! And had you not been messing with ma in the first place, maybe you wouldn't have been in this mess in the first place, and I probably would have been born to a better family, had a childhood, grow up with my sister with me and probably would have never been in gangs to begin with! And you know what's sad, even though you went through a lot of crap with ma, you could of done something about it..you could have cleaned up, got yourself a job and you could have paid off your debts and go back to school and try again on your dream job. But no, you were too busy being bitter, angry and drunk to do that...and look what happened, look at yourself!"

Joey grabbed his father's shoulder's and made him look at a broken mirror, "This is what you've become, pops! You have become what ma always told you would be! A jobless, lazy and angry drunk! You could have proved her wrong! You could have made something of yourself and showed her she was wrong, like she was wrong about me being a street punk and becoming just like you!"

Jordan looked into his reflection and was shocked by Joey's words. What Jordan saw was a slightly overweight, filthy and angry looking man who looked absolutely pathetic. Like a declawed and defanged lion no longer in his prime, just a middle aged man with nothing.

Joey lets go of him, "But it's too late now, you've sunken so low you won't be able to climb back up to the top again. But I won't let ma tell me I'm no better than you, because unlike her I'm going to finish high school when she didn't, and unlike you when I get to college I plan to graduate from it and get my degree, and neither of you are going to stop me or tell me otherwise!"

Joey steps away from his father and heads to his room, while Jordan continued starring into his reflection. When Joey came out, he had his bags packed and went to the door, while he had his hand on the nob he looked at his father, "Know this, pops, I did want to help you, and I did want us to be a family...but you took things too far, and I can't deal with this anymore. As far as I'm concerned, I have no father...and I never want to see you again...take care, Jordan." Joey opened the door and closed the door behind him.

Jordan continued looking into his reflection, soon he started to see his younger self again. Thinner, healthier, no five o' clock shadow and most of all, happier. He started to remember the excitement and determination he had in his youth, how he couldn't wait to go to college and have a great job and make something of himself, how he was so full of energy he could do everything at once and was happy about everything and always had a smile.

But that Jordan Wheeler was dead, the Jordan Wheeler now was slightly overweight, always drinking, a college drop out, is in huge debt, divorced, has no future and has lost his smile, sanity and humanity. He didn't bother to hold back his tears.

"...Useless mutt"

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**The end**


End file.
